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Caray to call games for Fox Sports Net

Chip Caray received an early Christmas present on Monday morning, when Fox Sports Net hired him to serve as their play-by-play announcer for all the Braves games televised by Fox Sports South and SportSouth.

This was the role previously held by Jon “Boog” Sciambi, who accepted a full-time role with ESPN at the conclusion of this past season.

Later this morning, Fox Sports Net is supposed to officially announce this hiring of Caray, whose role as TBS’ lead baseball announcer was terminated on Nov. 30. That decision ended his association with Turner Sports, which handles all of the Braves games broadcast on Peachtree Television.

This arrangement will allow Caray to once again call a majority of the televised Braves games. During the past two seasons, he saw his workload with the Braves limited by the travel requirements that came with TBS’ national baseball package.

Unbelievable. I don’t know what to say. Chip Caray is a horrible announcer. He doesn’t know what the hell he’s talking about. He uses more cheesy clichés than any announcer I’ve ever seen. Overall, he adds zero value to the broadcast, often subtracting from it.

List of Chip’s qualifications:
1) Last name is ‘Caray’
2) Familiar face

That’s it. That’s the end of the list of positive things Chip Caray brings to the table. Yet, Fox Sports decides to hire him for no reason other than nepotism. Surely they’re not stupid enough to think he actually adds value to the broadcast, no? (Then again……)

Truth is, most fans watching these games doesn?t know what makes a good announcer. Most of them probably think Chip Caray is a competent announcer and are happy he?s returning.

It bothers me. Not because of the nepotism, but because of the fact that Fox Sports South decided to, instead of hiring a competent announcer, do the easy thing and hire a familiar face, despite the fact that he sucks. Incredibly lazy of them.

It?s like they?re trying to encourage ignorance and stupidity.

The worst part is that Chip brings out all the worst qualities in Joe Simpson. When Joe was broadcasting with Boog, he was decent. When he’s with Chip, they turn into a pair determined to be the last people on the planet that still judge fielders by their fielding percentage and pitchers by their victories.

Wow. Skip doesn’t quote the right stats according to Peter. Imagine that. Maybe You should email Skip a list of the stats that you feel are important. That way he can pepper his broadcast with some of those mind numbing calculations. That would be REALLY entertaining.

Although I have nothing against Chip Caray, I was hoping to sign in today to see if that we are getting closer to signing a bat. Our division rivals continue to make moves to get better. We have a glaring weakness that needs to be addressed for us to keep up. The Mets are going after Bay. With Beltran and David Wrights, that’s going to be a fierce lineup. You have to expect the Phils and Mets to put up at least 5 runs a game… even with our superb pitching, will we be able to put up 5 runs a game? … I’m not so sure.

I am really upset that the Braves would pair up Joe Simpson (a sabermetric denier) with another stats (and otherwise) simpleton like Chip Carey. Over the few years, Braves fans were blessed to tune in and hear enlightened play-by-play with Boog. Now each and every Braves fan will have their baseball IQ lowered 105 times next season with good old Chip and Joe.

Here is a quick Christmas list for Chip:

1. Online Subscription to Baseball Prospectus
2. Copy of BP 2010 Annual which comes out shortly
3. Website addresses for fangraphs.com (assuming that Chip knows how to use a computer)
4. Copy of “Baseball Between the Numbers”

Chip must know that he is a laughingstock around baseball. He should dedicate himself to study between now and spring training in an effort to improve himself and save us all from a really long and awful baseball season.

Oh I messed up I forgot to call him a Chip off the old block. I mean if we used the same criteria for Harry Caray, He would be rated as “one of the worst”. Would that be fair ?Maybe we should allow for the youth factor in this era of zero loyalty to team or game. Personally I think Joe Morgan is the worst announcer in baseball and look at the gig he has. Chip will do fine. I mean I buy the package and I listen to the other teams announcers, on occaision, we should be greatful for what we got.

This is some of the worst news I’ve heard this offseason. Boog was a great play-by-play guy and he is getting replaced by one of the worst in the game. I totally agree with PWHjort that this was simply laziness from Fox Sports. Chip messes facts up all the time and uses stupid lingo like “fisted” or “can of corn”. He also makes friends with guys on the team and that makes him biased. He defended Mike Hampton to the death when he was here.

I wish that the braves would have gone a different way that with Chip, but lets be honest he got the job only because of his name. It happens all of the time. Look around where you work, are there not people around that have a job only because of who they know? It happens, I don’t care for him, but i care more about watching the braves than listening to Chip ramble around. I just hope that the announcing doesn’t get as bad as the Marlins announcers. As for talking about roster moves. Just because no one has posted anything on a blog or message board about the Braves trying to make trades does not mean that nothing is going on.

Now I now Buster Olney probably just got bored and posted this but: He reports that the Yankees are working very hard for a starting pitcher tonight. He also says it might be for Aaron Harang. He had a 4.21 ERA and pitched 162 and a third innings last year and he is due 12.5M next year and a option for next year at 12.75 FRANK WREN please call Cashman and tell him that Derek Lowe is his guy we will eat 9 mill (3 mill a year) for Nick Swisher. If he says no, I don’t care if we trade him for a few baseballs and a fungo bat.

Allright guys: I just read on MLB Trade Rumors 9:58 (The time I read it) David O’Brien says “”Got a call from a NY writer today wanting to know if I?d heard anything heating up between Yankees and Braves?. Apparently Yankees have hinted at doing ?something big? soon. Don?t know if that means pitching”. Did I just call a trade?

This is really stupid. Melky Cabrera? No knock to him but for Vasquez? Come on we should have gotton him for Lowe. This whole offseason I’ve been hearing. “The Braves want to trade Lowe but if they want the big bat they need to trade Vasquez.” Where is our big bat? Melky? You can’t be serious!

19 year old Vizcaino could make this deal worth it for the Braves. If Melky can produce more runs in the National League than he did at the bottom of the Yankees order, and the prospects pan out, this was a good trade for one season of Vazquez.

The Braves just traded a $100 bill and a $10 bill for a $20, a $10, and a $5 bond with a good interest rate. Melky isn’t even better than Brandon Jones. I’m going to have to assume there is a secondary trade that Melky is to be a part of. Maybe it is somebody else, but there has to be another trade for a real bat that is a two for one or three for one about to happen. If we got Melky to keep him we made a huge mistake, even if we have a side deal with Vazquez to come back after the contract expires, which we probably don’t. If he can’t hit 10 HRs a year left handed in Yank-everything stadium, the power outage when he arrives at Turner will be disturbing.

No offense, but KJ could have done what Melky is going to do this season if he gets to play at Turner Field for the home team. More speed, more power, same average. Yikes!!!

Brilliant move by Wren!!! Jk
there better be some big plan for 1b or another position, cause I would think heyward could put up Melky nbers right off the bat. We need a cleanup hitter! At least swisher couldve filled that role. We basically got another Diaz to play right. There better be a plan and not just getting derosa to play first. That’s just not enough. Bill, I’ve agreed w wren fr most of his deals, but I’ll agree that this is pretty bad unless there’s more in the works.

I would have liked to have gotten more in return for JV, but I’m not unhappy with the prospect of having Lowe for the next three years. I know it’s a lot of money, but come on, the guy won 15 games on a team with no offense when he was pitching like crap. I expect him to have a great year – and as for him being ticked off about the trade rumors, he’s a pro and he’ll get over it. And for a guy who’s initials are DL, he’l be healthy and he’ll log innings. So I’m glad to have Lowe on the staff again this year.

As for Melky… good player. Not enough for JV, but good player. Great upside. But again, no power to speak of. However, this gives us about ten million extra to throw at a free agent, so let’s get a power hitting 1bman.

There’s GOT to be more to this deal… something HAS to be in the works.
Man, the Yankees can get better and not even have to spend money… who knew?
Frank – They don’t need any help in getting better… don’t give players to them for nothing!

Viva – good point. Still don’t like the trade, if this is all we do to “improve” our offense – but you’re right, they are taking on his contract. He had a Cy Young vote this year. The Yanks just got a hell of a lot better. Before today, I would argue we had the best rotation in baseball… I’m not so sure anymore.

Melky has an upside? Melky has been around long enough to have a track record, and too long to be discussing “an upside” anymore. He is what he is and has been, a light hitting (under .400 Slugging), average OF, the likes of which the Braves organization is completely full of already. There has got to be another trade that we are stacking up MLB ready throw ins for. Heyward, if he struggles badly, will end the season with numbers better than an average Melky Cabrera season. And, he’ll have done it in a much larger park than Yankee Stadium is to a lefty.

I might as well add my two cents worth on Chip Carey. I think, from the outside looking in, that he was “himself” when he was with the Cubs. The reaction to that version of “Chip” was that he was too negative and they basically ran he and Steve Stone out of town. It is no secret Skip got him the job in Atlanta the first time. To his credit, Chip redid the image a little when he got here and he hasn’t been as negative as before. The problem is he just isn’t universally liked, and he has resorted to lame imitations of his dad and grandfather to try to be more popular. It didn’t work for me, but as long as he doesn’t spend the entire telecast counting to 100 like so many do now, I’ll live with having him here until they can find another option. Smoltz will eventually get the gig.

Speculation from ESPN: (so please don’t take too seriously) The Vazquez deal frees up about $9 million for the Braves to spend on upgrading their offense — Vazquez’s $11.5 million salary, minus the $3 million or so Cabrera figures to earn via arbitration, and getting the $500,000 in cash from the Yankees.

They’ll now look to use that surplus on an outfield bat, a first baseman or possibly both.

Damon is one possibility, particularly because his home in Orlando is within minutes of the Braves’ spring training complex. Another option is free agent Xavier Nady, who could play first or the outfield and would come at a relatively low base price because he is recovering from his second Tommy John surgery.

Or the Braves could look to deal an outfielder — either Cabrera or possibly Jordan Schafer — for a bat. They’ve been linked in trade rumors to Florida Marlins second baseman Dan Uggla, who could potentially slide to first base.

I still think it’s ridiculous to trade Schafer at this point. And the Marlins would want too much more in that package for Uggla. Melky puts up Ryan Church numbers, and is obviously not the answer in RF. Hopefully this was made to get the prospects and then ship Cabrera off somewhere else. They may still want to wait on Heyward for a few months, but come on.. another atypical corner outfielder? I’m sure they could have gotten Swisher, but opted to use that money elsewhere, so let’s stay hopeful there are more plans. Wren isn’t an idiot although many of you seem to think so.

I’m excited the Braves were able to get Viscaino, who has #1 potential, and could be in Atlanta in a couple of years. He is impressive. That said….Melky? I would’ve preferred the Braves pass on Melky for another grade-B prospect. At least that way they’re not on the hook for 3 million dollars for, yet another, 4th outfielder. How many fringe-outfielders do we need? My guess is that the Yankees made Viscaino available on condition the Braves would take Melky. Dunn, it appears, is an upgrade over Logan, but he’s not anything to get excited about.

I don’t feel as there is any reason to be up in arms about this trade. Viscaino definately seems to be the center of the trade for the Braves, and could be a great pitcher for the future. Did anyone think that we were crazy when we made the trade for Jurrjens and Gorkys Hernandez? Melky, obviously, is not the bat that we were seeking. Now that we have about 9mil or so to use I would expect us to go after a big bat. Would be nice to have a deal involving Melky along with another prospect or so. Let’s be honest, Javy had an absolutely amazing season last year, and he’s got great stuff. However, with that being said, looking at Javy’s track record he will not be as dominate in NY. But I do wish we could have gotten a better player than Melky from the Yanks. I would like to see what we get from Dunn and Viscaino in the next couple of years. This trade may take a couple of years down the road to completely see what we actually got for Javy.

When I said there weren?t any takers for Lowe, even I didn?t think that Wren would be this desperate. It sad that we have to trave Javy even though his salary is reasonable and he was lights out last year. We are still paying for Wrens screw up with lowe last season and his moronic marketing campaign with Lowe this year(hey, let?s announce to the world that DL is available and he is so bad that we will pay most of his contract so someone will take him). That and we want to use the marginal amount of money we would save from that deal to sign another mediocre outfielder(to add to our other mediocre outfielders, Diaz excepted) or a 1B who sucks. We don?t want to talk to our current players agents because we really don?t care if they hate the organization after we trash them. Frank Wren has the people skills of a Wild Russian Boar and uses they to great effect in his job. Yankees fans are dancing in the streets tonite. You should go check out their blogs.

“So Billreef hasn’t heard so much as a “whisper” from any team expressing interest in Lowe? That certainly must mean there’s no interest, seeming how Billreef is in the know and all. What else do your sources tell you?

Frank Wren has done an admirable job thus far. I love how we’re only a month into free agent signings and everyone is panicking. We sign a few people to minor league contracts and invite them to Spring Training and people assume that’s all Wren is going to do in the offseason. Give Wren until March to evaluate his offseason. He’s not finished. And just because you don’t read that Braves are chasing a “bona fide power threat”, it doesn’t mean they aren’t. Yesterday I read that the Cubs weren’t getting any takers on Bradley and all of the sudden today he’s gone and is a Mariner. Many GM’s keep things pretty close and I think Wren has learned to stay in that category”.

I know why this trade was made now! Frank Wren is in Mexico! Hahaha well that explains it. He was probably in the club as the deal was going down and Melky Cabrera sounds a lot like Nick Swisher when you got “Empire State of Mind” blaring in your ear.

The whole reason we’re in this predicament to salary dump a pitcher in the prime of his career who just finished 4th in the Cy Young race all comes down to Frank Wren last off season. He did a great job of bringing Vasquez and Lowe on board to fill our need for starting pitching. However, he completely went out of his mind locking up Kenshin Kawakami to a long term deal. No offense to Kenshin – but he’s the really salary hound in this scenario. Tommy Hanson should have been the 5th starter last year. He was ready. If not him, then we could have found a 5th starter somewhere else. Locking up a Japanese pitcher with no MLB experience to that kind of long term deal was irresponsible. Waiting until June to bring up Hanson accomplished nothing. It was a terrible decision and we’re paying for it now. The AJC is ripping Wren for this trade and The Yankee fans are laughing at us now for what we just gave them. Dumping Texeira to the Angels at least yielded Adam Laroche…. eventually. And he’s lucky we were able to do that.
Now we have 9 million dollars to somehow find a bat to get us over the hump. We still have a good team, but our division is stacked with pitching and incredible offense. Our offense, however, is average. I’m not so sure Xavier Nady is the answer to that. With the loss of Vasquez, I’m fearful that our rotation has taken a pretty big hit too.

I understand the need to dump salary, and the great value we got in return in a blue chip pitching prospect, but unless major wheeling and dealing is on the near horizon, this trade destroys any idea of giving Bobby Cox one last run at the postseason. In adding Melky Cabrera, Wren has accomplished something most of us thought would be impossible: creating a starting outfield with less power potential than the one the Braves fielded at the start of the 2008 season. No matter whom Wren adds to play first base, the weakest hitting outfield in the history of organized baseball (and an outfield that?s slightly below average defensively as well) will be too large an obstacle to overcome. I think I’m almost ready to join the billreef fan club.

On Troy Glaus…
“The 33-year-old was limited to 14 games with the Cardinals this past season after undergoing right shoulder surgery in January. Upon returning to the field in September, he batted .172 (5-for-29) with two RBIs.

Glaus has played 1,336 career games at third base and only six at first, with all those appearances coming within the past two seasons. ”
Awesome – an injury-prone 3rd baseman approaching his mid 30’s who hasn’t had a decent season since ’07 and has played First Base six times in his career.

Rosenthal now claims that the Braves are about to sign Troy Glaus to play first base, which can?t be very expensive, so maybe Nady or DeRosa or Dye or Damon is still in the picture for the outfield with Melky moving into the Greg Norton role. On the plus side with Melky, those guys in the right field bleachers have a new costuming option to replace the one they lost when Frenchy?s Franks faded into obscurity. Can?t wait to see those giant milk jug costumes!

Anyone else think that it was odd to trade Javy-Logan together again. Those guys can’t escape each other. . .
I have to admit, with the Glaus signing, that I’m confused. However, I’m assuming that Glaus will cost us next to nothing and is worth a cheap risk. One can only hope that Wren is still looking for one more bat. However, it appears that things are starting to get crowded. I have to admit, I do not know a lot about Cabrera, anyone know if he is capable of hitting leadoff?

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